First Evidence of Human Zoonotic Infection by Onchocerca lupi (Spirurida, Onchocercidae)

Human Ocular Infection with Dirofilaria repens (Railliet and Henry, 1911) in an Area Endemic for Canine Dirofilariasis

“…7 This approach, coupled with morphologic identification, enabled us to describe the first case of human intraocular infection with Onchocerca lupi in Turkey. 8 In spite of its reduced pathogenicity for dogs, D. repens is the species most frequently identified in human cases and it has been recently considered as an emerging metazoonosis in southern Europe. [4][5][6] Although the relationship between animal and human cases of dirofilariasis in a given area could be expected, the correlation between infection rate in dogs and in humans has not been clearly documented.…”

Case report of an epidural cervical Onchocerca lupi infection in a 13-year-old boy

“…No other Onchocerca species have been reported to infect the intradural or extradural space of the cervical spine. [4][5][6]9,15,16,21,23 No prior reports have documented the treatment of CNS O. lupi infections in humans; however, ivermectin has been demonstrated to kill O. volvulus larvae and promote the death of adult worms when administered 4 times per year. The first patient diagnosed with O. lupi infection of the epidural cervical spine was also treated with ivermectin, 5 and interestingly, was also a Native American residing in northeastern Arizona.…”

Blackfly vectors of zoonotic onchocerciasis in Japan

“…Onchocerca jakutensis (Gubanow, 1964), a parasite of deer, was identified by DNA analysis in the case from Austria (Koehsler et al, 2007), and Onchocerca lupi Rodonaja, 1967, a parasite of canids, was suspected in the case from Albania (Sréter et al, 2002) and confirmed in the case from Turkey (Otranto et al, 2011). A recent study shows that O. lupi is responsible for ocular zoonotic onchocerciasis (Otranto et al, 2011).…”

“…Onchocerca jakutensis (Gubanow, 1964), a parasite of deer, was identified by DNA analysis in the case from Austria (Koehsler et al, 2007), and Onchocerca lupi Rodonaja, 1967, a parasite of canids, was suspected in the case from Albania (Sréter et al, 2002) and confirmed in the case from Turkey (Otranto et al, 2011). A recent study shows that O. lupi is responsible for ocular zoonotic onchocerciasis (Otranto et al, 2011). By contrast, the causative Onchocerca species for all nine cases found in Japan was demonstrated to be Onchocerca dewittei japonica Uni et al, 2001, a new subspecies from wild boar (Sus scrofa Linnaeus, 1758), although the aetiology of the first case was originally suspected to implicate O. cervicalis or O. gutturosa (Beaver et al, 1989) and that in the second case to implicate O. gutturosa (Takaoka et al, 1996).…”

“…[Correction added on 17 August 2012, after first online publication: Number of cases of zoonotic onchocerciasis was changed from 16 to 15.] These include one from Albania (Pampiglione et al, 2001), one from Austria (Koehsler et al, 2007), one from Hungary (Sallo et al, 2005), one from Kuwait (Hira et al, 2008), eight (one unpublished and four published cases from Oita, one published case from Hiroshima, and two unpublished cases from each of Hiroshima and Shimane, in the southwest of Honshu) from Japan (Takaoka et al, 1996(Takaoka et al, , 2004Uni et al, 2010;Uni et al, 2012;unpublished data), one from Turkey (Otranto et al, 2011), and two from the U.S.A. (Burr et al, 1998;Wright et al, 2002).…”